


Praying So Hard on Bloody Knees

by jojothecr



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Episode Related, Hurt Sam Winchester, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Self-Harm, Written in 2012
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-26
Updated: 2012-02-26
Packaged: 2017-10-31 18:30:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/347132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jojothecr/pseuds/jojothecr
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>7x15 <em>Repo Man</em><br/><em>“He’s not leaving,” Sam says; voice low and sleepy, and full of pain.</em><br/>Warning: Blood (self-harm)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Praying So Hard on Bloody Knees

Sighing, Dean opens his eyes to the silent darkness which is only interrupted by the sporadic flickering of the neon vacancy sign outside and the sound of nearby traffic. He turns onto his other side with a tired groan, struggling to see through the darkness and discover what’s woken him up in the first place. At first he sees nothing, just shadows that have no shape, no structure, but there’s something else there, more than gloom and empty spaces. There’s a smell, as familiar as their surname, but strange, all of a sudden nameless.

He reaches out, his fingers stumbling over the nightstand, the drawers, knocking over something that makes a little glassy sound when it hits the floor, before he finally finds the switch for the lamp. He turns his head away and down, looking at the floor to let his eyes adjust to the sudden burst of light. There are smudges on the ground that he hadn’t noticed before, dark and irregular blotches of red that blend into one thick pool of dark, angry ruby. New droplets continue to trickle down, making quiet, wet noises on the linoleum.

Following the bloody tracks up the bed sheet, Dean’s eyes slide over Sam’s endless legs, covered in faded jeans, before moving higher and settling on the source of all the gore. Sam is awake, but barely so, sitting in the middle of his bed with his hands spread on his knees like a puppet. His arms are turned with the insides up, baring the tender skin, dirty and shaking. And cut open.

“Fuck, Sam…” Dean chokes on his own breath. His chest feels suddenly too tight, too small, closing around his heart like a vice.

There are three wounds on Sam’s left forearm, two on the other. They are bad enough, though nothing worse than what happens to them basically every week. They just feel more real, more dangerous, more scary because they’re done by Sam’s own knife, his own hand.

“He’s not leaving,” Sam says; voice low and sleepy, and full of pain. His fingers find one of the slices on his forearm blindly, the cut a few inches long, deep and bleeding openly. He scratches at it, smearing the blood up and down his pale skin, deepening the wound. He looks up at Dean, but higher, above him, behind him, and Dean can’t _not_ look there. Eyes barely leaving Sam’s white, sweaty face he turns his head to the side, looking over his shoulder, expecting to really see something in the dark corner. Some _one_. He sees nothing, but that doesn’t mean Sam’s seeing the same. Looking back at his brother, Dean stands up, heading for the bathroom.

Sam scratches his arm again, winces, and shakes his head. “He’s not _leaving_ ,” he repeats, whispers, his voice scared and exhausted but urgent, broken. Dean slaps his hand away, hard, and Sam looks at him accusingly but he lets his hand fall, doesn’t touch his arm again.

Dean wants to tell him to stop, tell him don’t do it, don’t do this to yourself, but it’d be nothing but hypocritical. He hadn’t been doing any better when he’d left the pit three, maybe a hundred, years ago. There had been nothing then, his skin baby soft and clean, erased of all scars, whether they had been one year old or twenty, until Dean had started drawing his own map of pain.

The towels Dean finds in the bathroom aren’t crispy clean or soft, rather they're threadbare, but they’re good enough and the best they currently have. He soaks them in cold water and grabs three rolls of bandages from his duffel, making a mental note to himself to buy more. A lot more. Soon.

Sitting down on his bed, he reaches for Sam’s right arm, the one where there are ‘only’ two cuts and wraps one of the towels around it. He doesn’t tie it up, just presses it there, but Sam hisses in pain nevertheless. Dean wonders if he’s only now realizing what he’s done, if the pain’s only now penetrating his brain. Guiding Sam’s arm gently away to rest in his lap, Dean wraps his fingers around Sam’s left wrist and places his palm onto his knee. The wounds are worse here, deeper, longer, a little more open. Scrunching the towel into a tight ball, Dean cleans the cuts with careful dabs, lightly touching Sam’s bleeding skin, stubbornly pushing away the tears that sting his eyes, blinding his vision.

The towel is more red, all shades of it, than white when he’s done, and more blood trickles from Sam’s slashes in thick, glistening drops. He wraps the bandages around Sam’s forearm then, not too tight, just enough not to let it slip, then repeats the same process with his other arm.

When he puts the towels aside his face is wet, tears and sweat sliding down his cheeks in tiny drops.

He wishes he could be more surprised by what Sam’s doing, what’s happening to him, with him. He wishes he could blame someone else, _anyone_ else, but himself, but he can’t. _He_ ’s done this, he’s brought all these horrible nightmares and visions on Sam. _He_ has torn him apart.

“Sammy.” He touches his palm to Sam’s face, his cheek, caressing his cheekbone gently. Sam’s eyelashes flutter, sliding slowly closed, then open again, fast, and a frown appears on his forehead. Dean wonders what he’s just seen, how dark and bloody, how painful it really was. Sliding his fingers into Sam’s hair, soft and dampened with sweat, he presses his lips to Sam’s, hot and burning, trembling. “Sammy, remember me. Remember _us_.”

It’s been long, _so_ long. The memory is like a faded photograph now, crumpled, with well-thumbed corners and torn.

~  
“Don’t go,” Dean had said, _begging_ , clutching the sleeve of Sam’s T-shirt convulsively to keep him there, close, for one moment more. His voice was shaking and hoarse, pathetic. He could barely see the regretful smile on his brother’s beautiful face through the veil of salt standing in his eyes but he knew it was there. He hoped it was. “Sammy, stay with me.”

Sam hadn’t. Sam had a dream he decided to follow, to fulfill, a phantom image of a person he wanted to become, to be, without his past and family holding him back. Dean was nothing in his plan, nothing more than an obstacle that had to be overstepped. Dean was just a touch in the twilight of Texas nights, a kiss, and forbidden moments of passion and need that were better left behind, forgotten, denied.  
~

At first, Sam’s lips are hesitant and closed, barely parting beneath the touch of Dean’s tongue. Then he sighs, lets out a shuddery moan that sounds loud in the silence of the room, and Dean can literally _feel_ it sliding down his spine. He opens up, his tongue flicking out to meet Dean’s. His hands are cold when they brush Dean’s sides, trembling, sliding down to anchor on his hips, gripping harder, almost too tight, and pulling him closer. Sam tastes of… Sam. A temping, irresistible combination of Sammy, sweet and innocent, the one that had left, and Sam, sharp and dangerous, the one he’s now. There's also an underlying hint of copper and fear. Dean thinks he tastes a little like hell.

Too soon Sam pulls back, flushed and gasping for breath. He’s holding tight onto Dean, won’t let him pull away, not even an inch, but Dean doesn’t feel like moving away anyway. He puts his mouth to Sam’s ear, his lips brushing smooth, warm skin, ruffling his hair. “He still here?” he asks quietly before he leans back a little, his fingers running along Sam’s jawline, down the hollow of his throat.

Eyes wide, Sam looks around, disbelief and denial shifting on his face like clouds before a storm, replaced a moment later by relief. He shakes his head.

“Think he’s got an issue with incest?” Dean wonders, quirking his eyebrow in a silly, exaggerated gesture.

Sam’s laugh is loud, startling and unexpected, rough, but Dean can’t recall anything that sweet.

He knows it’s not gone, not by a long shot, that the Devil is still close, teetering just at the edge of consciousness, prepared to step up again out of the corner of Sam’s mind, but for now it’s all he can do. If Sam can have one night without nightmares, Dean is happy.

“Stay with me?”

“Not going anywhere.”

 

Sam’s fingertips are cold on Dean’s skin as they move over his features, the wrinkles on his forehead that no longer disappear, along the contour of his nose, his mouth. “I forgot how it feels,” he says, his eyes intently tracking the movements of his hand. Even his fingernails are bloody, Dean notices. “How _you_ feel. I forgot how much I loved touching you.”

Dean shifts closer, nose to nose and breath to breath with Sam, his hand on Sam’s hipbone, pushing beneath the layers of his clothing. “Feel free to never stop."


End file.
